Hi everyone,
It looks like I will be returning to model railroading after a very long absence. The last time I had a layout at my disposal was when I was child — the train set that was taken apart by my Dad when I left for college and had probably sat idle for years before that. I have recently bought my first house, and in the process of moving, discovered the trains that had been packed away, and decided hey, why not see what I can do with this stuff again? Now I've got my own basement to build it in, so why not?
When I was a kid, not surprisingly I had less of a desire to pay attention to the details, particularly when it came to track layout. I basically just mashed it together and made it do what I wanted it to do. This time around though, I would like to pre-plan my layout such that I know that the track I am using will be capable of doing what I am planning on doing.
It will be a while until my basement is ready for proper construction, so I am satisfying my itch by "building" a layout in Adode Illustrator. I have measured some pieces of Atlas track, and using those measurements, I have tried to pre-plan my track layout, using a few basic guidelines about what I know I want present in the layout and how the track fits/should fit together. For example, I assembled a simple circle of 18" radius track, and took note of the fact that 3 pieces of "pre-cut" curve track gives you one 90º portion of a circle, which means that each full piece of track represents 30º of a 360º circle... etc etc. This allows me to draw the various track segments and then properly rotate and fit them together when necessary. It has allowed me to estimate distances down to some very small numbers - ten-thousandths of an inch in some cases.
My problem, and therefore my question, comes from a couple of dangerous assumptions I am making about the track I will be using, which I had to make because I did not have access to the necessary track to measure it. First of these assumptions is 22" radius curves - how many pieces of "pre-cut" Atlas 22" radius curve make up a 90º turn? I assumed that three curves again would make 90º, as it does with 18" radius curve. But if it doesn't, and say it takes four pieces of 22" radius curve to make a 90º turn, then the layout I have drawn up for myself needs major modification.
The second and probably much more critical/dangerous assumption I have made involves switches/turnouts. Are switches (be it #4, #6 turnout, whatever the appropriate turnout # may be) manufactured to mimic 18" radius curves or 22" radius curves? Preliminary measurements I have taken from some of the packaged Atlas switches I have indicate that maybe I have jumped the gun in assuming that you can simply remove one curved section of track from a simple circle and replace it with a turnout and not effect the shape of that circle. The question at hand applies to both straight and curved turn-outs.
As mentioned above, if one or both of these assumptions is off base, which is entirely possible, then it's back to the drawing board for me. And while that isn't very much of a big deal (I doodled this up in my spare time), it would be nice to go back to that drawing board actually knowing what I am doing this time.
It looks like I will be returning to model railroading after a very long absence. The last time I had a layout at my disposal was when I was child — the train set that was taken apart by my Dad when I left for college and had probably sat idle for years before that. I have recently bought my first house, and in the process of moving, discovered the trains that had been packed away, and decided hey, why not see what I can do with this stuff again? Now I've got my own basement to build it in, so why not?
When I was a kid, not surprisingly I had less of a desire to pay attention to the details, particularly when it came to track layout. I basically just mashed it together and made it do what I wanted it to do. This time around though, I would like to pre-plan my layout such that I know that the track I am using will be capable of doing what I am planning on doing.
It will be a while until my basement is ready for proper construction, so I am satisfying my itch by "building" a layout in Adode Illustrator. I have measured some pieces of Atlas track, and using those measurements, I have tried to pre-plan my track layout, using a few basic guidelines about what I know I want present in the layout and how the track fits/should fit together. For example, I assembled a simple circle of 18" radius track, and took note of the fact that 3 pieces of "pre-cut" curve track gives you one 90º portion of a circle, which means that each full piece of track represents 30º of a 360º circle... etc etc. This allows me to draw the various track segments and then properly rotate and fit them together when necessary. It has allowed me to estimate distances down to some very small numbers - ten-thousandths of an inch in some cases.
My problem, and therefore my question, comes from a couple of dangerous assumptions I am making about the track I will be using, which I had to make because I did not have access to the necessary track to measure it. First of these assumptions is 22" radius curves - how many pieces of "pre-cut" Atlas 22" radius curve make up a 90º turn? I assumed that three curves again would make 90º, as it does with 18" radius curve. But if it doesn't, and say it takes four pieces of 22" radius curve to make a 90º turn, then the layout I have drawn up for myself needs major modification.
The second and probably much more critical/dangerous assumption I have made involves switches/turnouts. Are switches (be it #4, #6 turnout, whatever the appropriate turnout # may be) manufactured to mimic 18" radius curves or 22" radius curves? Preliminary measurements I have taken from some of the packaged Atlas switches I have indicate that maybe I have jumped the gun in assuming that you can simply remove one curved section of track from a simple circle and replace it with a turnout and not effect the shape of that circle. The question at hand applies to both straight and curved turn-outs.
As mentioned above, if one or both of these assumptions is off base, which is entirely possible, then it's back to the drawing board for me. And while that isn't very much of a big deal (I doodled this up in my spare time), it would be nice to go back to that drawing board actually knowing what I am doing this time.
"Don't open the gates!! Who the hell needs a wooden horse that size anyway?!?!"